The Isabel Wilner Papers contain manuscripts, typescripts,
dummies, correspondence, printed material, and photographs created and
accumulated between 1958 and 1993. Wilner's papers were created from her
composition of three published books and two articles, as well as from public
poetry readings performed in schools. A former laboratory school librarian,
Isabel Wilner has published three books: a children's poetry anthology and two
alphabet picture books.

Isabel Wilner was born in
Shanghai, China, on February 17, 1920, the daughter of Episcopal missionaries.
She lived in China and the Philippines until she left to attend college in the
United States at age eighteen. Wilner earned a B.A. degree in English from
William Smith College in 1942 and a B.S. degree in library service from the
Carnegie Library School in 1945. For the next four years, she worked as a
children's librarian in Pittsburgh and New York City and as an army librarian
in the Philippines and Okinawa. She became the librarian at the Lida Lee Tall
Laboratory School of Towson State College in Towson, Maryland, in 1949 and
remained there until her retirement in 1988.

Wilner published several poems in
Horn Book magazine between 1946 and 1984.
Her first children's book,
The Poetry Troupe, a children's poetry
anthology, appeared in 1977. She published two alphabet picture books in the
early 1990s:
B Is for Bethlehem (1990) and
A Garden Alphabet (1991). Isabel Wilner
passed away on March 16, 2011 in her home in Tunkhannock, PA.

Sources:Who's Who in Library and Information
Services, ed. Joel M. Lee (Chicago: American Library Association,
1982), 541."Children's alphabet book is a hit 33 years after it was
written,"
The Evening Sun (Baltimore, Md.), 28
November 1990, E1.Reminiscence of
The Horn Book by Isabel Wilner in
The Horn Book Virtual History Exhibit,
http://www.hbook.com/exhibit/remin_wilner.html, accessed 13 March 2003.

The Isabel Wilner Papers contain manuscripts, typescripts, dummies,
correspondence, printed material, and photographs created and accumulated by
Isabel Wilner between 1958 and 1993. Wilner's papers were created from her
composition of three published books and two articles, as well as from public
poetry readings performed in schools. The material is organized into three
series: books, public readings, and articles.

The Books Series contains manuscripts, typescripts, dummies,
correspondence, and printed material for all three of Wilner's children's
books. The material spans the years 1958 to 1992. The papers in the series are
arranged alphabetically by title and the material for each book is arranged
chronologically in order of creation when known. The container listing offers
detailed descriptions of the holdings for each title and information on the
material's process of creation may be gleaned easily from the container listing
for each book. Following departmental custom, the processor has numbered each
manuscript and typescript by order of creation (first, second, third,
etc.).

Isabel Wilner maintained correspondence files for her three books that
she kept in 3-ring binders. She punctuated the chronologically-arranged letters
with notes to provide commentary on the process of each book's creation.
Consequently, her edited correspondence provides a seamless account of the
production of each book.

The Public Readings Series consists of correspondence, photographs,
and newspaper clippings concerning public readings of poetry from
The Poetry Troupe. The material dates from
1974 to 1993 and is arranged chronologically. It documents both performances by
"poetry troupes" composed of children from the Lida Lee Tall School, as well as
poetry readings that Isabel Wilner conducted with grammar school classes in
several cities. The bulk of the material is letters from adults and
schoolchildren thanking Wilner for her appearances.

The Articles Series contains a typescript, correspondence,
photographs, and issues of academic journals that include two articles by
Isabel Wilner. Both articles describe the development of the poetry troupes at
the Lida Lee Tall School. The material dates from 1978 to 1983 and is arranged
alphabetically by the title of the article.

Restrictions on Use

Noncirculating; available for research.

Copyright Restrictions

The collection is protected by the Copyright Law of the United
States (Title 17, U.S. Code). Reproductions can be made only if they are to be
used for "private study, scholarship, or research." It is the user's
responsibility to verify copyright ownership and to obtain all necessary
permissions prior to the reproduction, publication, or other use of any portion
of these materials, other than that noted above.